December 31, 2014

Wishing you a Wonderful, Fresh & Green 2015


We just sent out a newsletter wishing everyone a Wonderful, Fresh and Green New Year.

Didn't receive anything?
No worries, you can check it out online:  For English click here | Voor Nederlands klik hier

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December 30, 2014

Get ready for 2015 with this Free Printable Calendar


Christmas has come and gone, and pretty soon the fireworks and champagne-corks will have sprung and we're in 2015.

Weeehaaa!

The anticipation and high spirits about the New Year usually dampen pretty quickly once we're well into the dull weeks of January and realize there's still quite some time to go before summer.

:-/

Luckily we usually have other fun things to look forward to during the year: Birthdays, party's, trips to the unknown...
Keep yourself motivated and keep track of what's coming on this Free Printable Wall Calendar.


The file comes as an A3-sized PDF (420 mm x 297 mm), but (obviously) can be scaled down and printed on A4- or letter-sized paper as well.

Once printed, you could use just punch holes in the pages and be done with it, or check out this little and easy tutorial:


Things you'll need:

-the printed calendar pages
-wooden half-round profiles (diameter ca 1cm - cheap in any hardware store)
-hole punch (the office-kind)
-little saw
-needle + nicely colored thread

Wat you do:

1. Cut the profiles to the same length as the long side of the pages + 1 cm on each side (comes down to 44 cm length if you printed A3)

2. Use the hole punch to punch evenly-spaced holes in all pages (4 holes for A3, 2 for A4)

3. Clamp the pages of the calendar between both half-round profiles (use a little tape on the part of the wood that's sticking out on both sides to help keep together) and, through each individual hole, wind the thread around the profiles.
End with winding thread around the outer edges of the wood and attach an extra piece to hang the calendar with.

Ta.
Da.

Enjoy your new calendar.
And your New Year!



December 29, 2014

A chronology of corks


During the final product-development stages of Waterworks we encountered some troubles with the cork stoppers we use.
We started out thinking that every cork would be both water- and air-tight.
That's what corks are made for, right?
Wrong.


Sadly, we found out the hard way that the 2000 agglomorated corks our supplier delivered with the first batch of Waterworks-sets back in the early days of summer, were actually not air-tight.
Minor detail you'd think?
Well, the fact that the corks weren't closing the reservoir air-tight, meant that no vacuum would be created in the glass bulb, and all sets would drain too fast.
This set-back cost us a major head-ache and then some...

Oh well.... no use to dwell on it.

Luckily we found a supplier in Portugal who could send us a new batch of natural corks within a week.
Just as well, since we never asked for agglomorated corks to start with, and preferred the look of natural cork anyway.


The only problem with these corks is that they're a natural product, which means no two corks are alike and some have bigger holes or cracks that make it difficult to close the reservoir air-tight.
Fine, we just had to personally test every cork stopper before adding it to a Waterworks-set.
Which we did.
And it cost us a lot of time.
And sadly some inconsistensies were hard to detect, which meant some Waterworks-sets were still draining too fast for no apparent reason.

After receiving a few questions about the speed in which the reservoir should drain, we decided we should come up with a better solution for the stopper and started exploring different possibilities.


First thing we did was order the silicon stoppers that are used in the scientific world.
Obviously they were up for the job: closing the holes with an ice-cold air-tight precision. However, the look and feel of the corks was exactly like that: ice-cold and scientific.
Not at all fresh and green.

We decided to try and produce silicone corks ourselves, and attempt to recreate the natural feeling we love so much.


We made a mold and test-'corks', adding grit and cork-gratings to the mix. All in our endeavour to create natural-looking but 100% air-tight corks.
We ended up with a lovely material made of the grated corks that looked pretty similar to the agglomorated corks we started with, while retaining a complete air-tightness.

But.... although the mixture we cooked up was so alike the agglomorated corks, our preference was to find something that would better resemble our natural corks.

We thought of another possible solution: what if we could 'dress' the corks we have with a little air-tight shell, only around the bottom part, keeping most of the natural look-and-feel in-tact?


We dipped corks in liquid rubber and used the necks of (happily colored) balloons to test our theory, which turned out to be spot-on.
We thought shrink-fit tubing would be perfect for the job. It took us a while to find the right type, size and color, but eventually we succeeded.
After some testing we even found a comparatively quick and easy way to add the layer to our corks.

From now on, expect your Waterworks-corks to be dressed!
Make sure to contact us if you think the cork you have might not be completely air-tight, we'll happily send you a new and improved cork stopper.


December 20, 2014

About a lovely shop in Heemstede, named Homestede

Photograph courtesy of Homestede.nl

Once there was a lovely town in the west of the Netherlands, situated between Haarlem and the Sea, with the lovely name Heemstede.
And in that lovely town there was a lovely shopping street with lovely shops and one of those lovely shops was named Homestede.

Homestede was always great, but since last Friday it became even better: that's when they started selling Waterworks!

So if you're living close to Heemstede and are looking for a sustainable gift, check out Homestede on Raadhuisstraat 86!

For more, check out the Homestede website.

Photograph courtesy of Homestede.nl

December 18, 2014

Waterworks now for sale @ Edwin Pelser Design store

Screenshot of the Edwin Pelser website

The collection of Edwin Pelsers' design shop in central Den Haag revolves around products with a story.
Edwin Pelser manages to bring all these stories from all those very different designers together in a harmonious unity in his living-room style store at the Piet Heinstraat.

We're very proud to be adding the story of Waterworks to the mix.

Edwin Pelser Designstore
Piet Heinstraat 123
2518 CG Den Haag

For more information and opening times check out Edwin Pelsers' website.


For more Waterworks points of sale, click here




December 15, 2014

Design By Craft on Waterworks


What a lovely showcase of Waterworks on Fair Dutch Design Platform Design By Craft (full article).

Design By Craft is an alternative webshop that focuses on hand-picked unique and customisable products with inspiring stories.
Their website is definitely worth a moment of your time.
Check it out here.

December 14, 2014

We're on Dutch Design Daily!

Screenshot - click for the full article on Dutch Design Daily
We're very proud to be featured on todays' Dutch Design Daily feed!

About Dutch Design Daily:
"Dutch Design Daily is a free app featuring every day a new topical subject from the broad field of Dutch Design such as architecture, e-culture, graphic design, fashion & textile, product design and spatial design. The app also shows interviews with designers and pays attention to education and heritage. "

To read the full article (available in Dutch and English) visit Dutch Design Daily.

Oh, and you might want to consider signing up for their free app for your daily dosis of Dutch Design.

New point of sale added: Conflict Maastricht

Photograph courtesy of Conflict.to
For everybody living in the South-Eastern peninsula of the Netherlands: Waterworks is now available at Conflict Design Market in Maastricht.

More about the shop:
"Conflict is located in the historical centre of Maastricht. The shop sells contemporary furniture, home accessories and designer gift items. The collection has a slight focus on Dutch Design. Featuring both designerlabels and self-producing designers like Koninklijke Tichelaar Makkum, Droog Design, Functionals, Royal VKB, Thomas Eyck, Goods just to name a few. The range is completed with some outstanding foreign designs like Braun, Authentics, Hay, Seletti amongst others."

Photograph courtesy of Conflict.to

Go and get your Waterworks-set now at Minckelerstraat 14.

Click here for more Waterworks points-of-sale. 

We're on Instagram, follow us!


Yes! House of Thol has an official Instagram-account!
Finally!

It took us a while, partly because you can only manage one instagram-account at a time on your phone, and i had my personal account going on. However, lately i've been sharing more and more House of Thol related pictures on that account and we decided to finish our Social Media collection by adding Instagram to the mix (we added Google+ as well, by the way).



Of course we were already on Pinterest: another image-driven social media channel that i absolutely love spending (way too much) time on.
What i adore about Instagram is that it's so personal: this is truly what's going on in peoples' lives right now (with a pretty filter added of course).


And now we'll be sharing what's going on with House of Thol on a day-to-day basis.
How about following us? We'll follow back! [click]

December 13, 2014

Holiday cheer: free gift wrapping on all orders



New feature in the House of Thol webshop: select your giftwrapping.
For this Holiday period we offer a lovely gift wrapping with a bit of added sparkle.


So if you're giving the gift of green fingers this Christmas, order in our webshop now to have us personally wrap your present!


Would you like to know how to DIY this wrapping paper click here. For an extremely easy 1-2-3 tutorial for the sparkly gift tags, read this blogpost.


December 12, 2014

Spice up your wrapping #02 - Glittery gift-tags in 3 minutes


After this tutorial to make your own wrapping paper, you must have been eagerly waiting for the promised Glittery gift-tag DIY.
Not?

Well, here it comes anyway:



What you need:
-Basic gift tags (buy them anywhere, or make them)
-Glitter
-Glue
-Brush
-Something to put the glitter on (i used a little plate)


Now, pay attention, because it all goes pretty fast...

1. Put the glitter on a little plate.
2. Brush glue on the lower part of the tag (both front and back).
3. Dip the glued areas into the glitter until fully covered.
4. Let dry.


Got it?
Takes three minutes. Tops.

NB: I tried glittering the entire tag and didn't find it that pretty, but feel free to try for yourself.

Happy gift-giving!

December 10, 2014

Spice up your wrapping #01 - Gift Wrap Tutorial


Wrapping packages in kraft paper is an all-time favorite.
For the Holiday season however, there's a perfect excuse to spice it all up a it, perhaps even add a bit of sparkle to the mix...


First things first: How to easily create your own wrapping paper.
Here goes....


Things you need:

- Kraft paper
- Rolling pin
- Tape
- Paper
- Scissors
- Foam stickers
- Paint (i would recommend acrylic paint because of the short time it takes to dry)
- Paint roller
- Christmas treats (alright, you don't really need those, although they do help set the tone)


Get everything ready to go.
You might want to protect your table a bit, since there's paint involved.

First thing to do:
1. Cover your rolling pin with paper.
Why? Well, firstly because you might want to use the rolling pin again (to bake cookies), secondly, because the foam stickers stick better on paper.


2. Cut the foam sticker into a gazillion little dots (or any shape you fancy really, i went for snowflakes/dots).
Mind you: this is the most annoying part of the whole thing, feel free to finish your Christmas treats while you're at it.


3. Stick the foam dots to the covered rolling pin, making sure you space them out evenly and randomly.


4. Paint and roll!
Use only a little bit of paint and re-apply after every 'roll' to achieve a natural and even result.


If you've used only a little paint like i adviced, the paper is ready to be rolled up again almost immediately after finishing.
Feel free to store it in waiting of the fab glitter-gift-tag tutorial we'll add Friday as a little week-end treat.

Enjoy!

December 7, 2014

New photographs by Masha Bakker

Finally! Today we received the highly anticipated photographs of a.o. our Waterworks packaging.

Waterworks packaging
by Masha Bakker Photography

The photographs were shot by talented photographer Masha Bakker, who also did a great job on the Waterworks photographs we've been using so far. (click here to read the 'behind the scenes').



by Masha Bakker Photography

We immediately added the photographs to the House of Thol webshop, the website will follow later.

by Masha Bakker Photography
by Masha Bakker Photography

Let us know what you think about these images. Are you missing any angles or close-ups?


by Masha Bakker Photography

If you like what you see, you might want to check out the rest of Masha Bakkers work on her website. Did you know she also does wedding photography?

Don't hesitate to get in touch for images in suitable for publication.



December 6, 2014

Getting things wrapped - part 01


It's that time of the year!

After the Dutch celebration of Sinterklaas had it's official grand finale on the 5th of December, we're now finally allowed to indulge ourselves in the wonderfully cheerful world of Christmas.

One of the Holiday promotions we offer in our new webshop is the option to have your order delivered to your mailbox beautifully wrapped and ready to gift.
The only thing left for you to do is write a name on the specially designed gift-tag (will be revealed soon) and find a nice place under the tree / around the mantelpiece.

Anyway, i went online for a little wrapping inspiration:

Found on Wit and Whistle
Found on My White Obsession
Triangle stickers from Blankgoods

From Weddingchicks.com
Spotted on You Are My Fave
From Manon21





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